


the water filled my lungs i screamed so loud but no one heard a thing

by thelimitsofthe_sea



Category: Kill Your Darlings (2013), Literary RPF
Genre: Child Abuse, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, M/M, Physical Abuse, Sexual Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-24
Updated: 2015-01-24
Packaged: 2018-03-08 20:31:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,262
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3222476
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thelimitsofthe_sea/pseuds/thelimitsofthe_sea
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You always hurt the one you love, the one you shouldn't hurt at all.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the water filled my lungs i screamed so loud but no one heard a thing

**Author's Note:**

> This has disturbing content, please don't read this if you think you will be triggered/upset.  
> Direct quotations/scenarios taken from a letter written by Caleb Carr (Lucien's son), which can be read here: http://dailycaller.com/2014/02/24/son-of-famous-beat-murderer-lucien-carr-disputes-kill-your-darlings-films-version-of-events/  
> Because this might be a bit confusing, the first part is Lucien's son confronting him, followed by Lucien's thoughts during David's murder, then concluding with Lucien and his son again.  
> I think it's important that we analyze the media we consume through a critical lens, even (maybe especially) if we like it.

The plain truth is ugly, horribly ugly. Naked, raw, split open- you can’t cover your eyes, you can’t turn away. A jagged blade pressed to the throat, no pretty words left to soften it. Building fury locked in the tremor of a clenched jaw, waiting to bust loose. Stared down by your own eyes, big fat ocean eyes now flinty faded jade, years of rage in them; seems that bruises do leave scars.

Searching for a justification, a reason for the unreasonable- the hands of a man have such an awesome power, they can build and they can break, the difference between a caress and a slap is all in the wrist.

When you speak he flinches back from it like it’s another blow, he curls into himself, and then the breath goes out of him. The air is ice and you can feel the muffled beating of your heart, and in that terrible moment that lasts for an age you know that you just spilt enough blood for a battlefield.

_Doesn’t that mean there’s a special bond between us?_

*****

_The reason I’m leaving is you_

He’s always there, a step behind, a hand on the elbow, eyes digging into the back of your head, fist around your heart. As if you could ever leave. Paris was a dream, a silly stupid dream that Jack was dumb, or maybe kind, enough to dream with you; there will be no freedom, no champagne, no victorious finale. But while Jack can wake up and turn back to reality with a shrug and a grin, for you it’s like hitting concrete at full speed, jarring and painful, because you’d always blurred the lines between reality and fantasy and maybe you’ve crossed them one too many times. He had to show up and ruin it, drag you back to earth, drag you back down with him.  And as he begs and pleads, you look at him, and that’s it. Something that has been shifting inside you sets irrevocably into place.

_Come on, we’re taking a walk_

You take another swig from the flask, feel it burn down your throat and settle in your stomach, fuelling something dangerous that’s collecting in your veins, your blood is running at boiling point.  He follows you- this friend, this father, this lover of yours. He always followed, always pursued, always got what he wanted.  Not this time.  He tries to grab you, make you look at him, and the touch of his hand is like a branding iron.

_I was just a kid, and you dragged me into your perverted mess!_

You remember the first time, a study in contrasts,  red and blond, freckled and pale, large and small, man and child- but both trembling, both shuddering,  both shaking –  anticipation and ecstasy and fear and pain can look the same , it’s hard to tell them apart. You weren’t the little fatherless boy who mistook this for love, you knew this wasn’t love, but you also knew this is what you had to do to get it.

_How can you say that? You know that’s not true_

At first you were unyielding as stone, but eventually you came undone under his hands; you gasped and arched and leaned into it and cried out.  And most of all, you enjoyed the control, you never knew your eyes looking like _that_ and your lips and the curve of your hipbone and the swell of your thighs had that much power.  It was like a hit, like the first shot, it burns but it warms you up; it’s heady and dangerous and it makes you feel alive even if you hate how you feel afterwards.  There’s pleasure in self-destruction, and that’s why we’re all cursed, why we drink ourselves dead and dope ourselves up and fuck ourselves raw because somehow we only feel like we can carry on when we’re destroying ourselves.  And something about it all fed your ego because even though he made all the rules you knew how to play his own game against him and maybe that way you’ll end with a flush.  It was fun.  My move, then yours, then mine again. Checkmate.

_I will never give up on us_

 True, when you woke up in the starched sterile linen sheets he was there, hovering anxiously over you. The air entered your lungs like fire, you hadn’t thought you’d breathe something so rich again; the stuffy air of the hospital was as clean and pure as holy water and it burned like absolution. You really had thought that was it for you, head in an everyday tomb, fumes leaving you gasping. He petted your hair, whispered sweet nothings, you cried, you took it because no one else was offering you anything and he was always _there_.  He really was your guardian angel, even if he was dragging you down to hell. And then Mexico, everything lush and bright, tumblers of daiquiri and salty ocean water and laughter and something tight in your chest, a bit like love but a lot like losing. It was all so goddamn normal, the sun so saturated it obliterated his darkness and your darkness, if only for a couple weeks. But then back to the grey city, where we can’t hide our starved greed, where it’s all cracks in the concrete and piss in the subway stations.

_You’re pathetic_

You spit it at him, your derision the sharpest weapon, and something in his face goes ugly. He always thought it was a noble affection, a tortured case of the Love that Dare not Speak its Name; and with two words you’d smashed that to pieces. Because he _was_ pathetic, overeager and trembling, begging for the touch of his angel as if it could save him. _But you tore my wings off, I can’t even fly for myself anymore, let alone take you up to heaven._ He lunges at you, everything violent and rabid and desperate that was simmering in him coming to the surface. And for the first time ever you fight back, you hit and snarl and claw, there’s something so ugly and broke in you and god you’re going to make him see it. Just as abruptly, it’s done, and you stand back, facing each other, breath coming heavy. You can feel your heartbeat drum against your temple, and every beat sounds like resolution.  This has gone on too long. And then the knife’s in your hands, and his eyes flash when he sees it, he recognizes it- of course he would, it was he who gave it too you all those years ago. And your hands are shaking and your heart is going even faster now, pounding against your ribcage like a wild animal trying to get out, but there’s a horrible anger in you, not the desperate kind, the kind that’s like ice, like steel, and you’re feeding off it to keep going.

_Now I know how you felt_

_When?_

_When you wanted to die_

And you just snap. The dam you’d spent years building burst at those words, and the waves are furious. You stab and stab again and again, out of control and horribly deliberate at the same time; he’d had himself on you so many times, it was your turn now, and you wonder whose weapon was really more deadly. Your faces inches apart, so close you can feel his breath on your face, looking straight into his eyes, this act somehow more intimate than anything you’ve done before. He doesn’t know, he doesn’t know at all how you felt that night, how you’ve felt every night since that night, how you’ll feel  every night for as many nights as you have. The shame and disgust you felt the first time you came with him, standing under the shower until your skin is pink and blistered but you’re never fucking clean. You could never write, you’d sit with paper in front of you and a pen but nothing ever came out, it was all hollow and contrived and dead. That’s why you clung to them, to Bill and Allen and Jack, because they could make the very words sing and throb with life, every letter bleeding, every sentence a prayer. But maybe you had just as much love and anger and sadness inside you, maybe you even had more, maybe you could have written brilliant poems and devastating novels, but he took that from you, he took every word you had before you could even speak it. So you manipulated, you flirted, you lied- anything to get other people to speak for you, because you didn’t have a voice of your own. Holding him in your arms, his eyes locked on yours, pleading, the water around you seeping red, you couldn’t tell who was the child anymore. He was gasping, chest heaving, body fighting, holding on in between the line that separates life and death- and you had the power.

You let him go.

****

But you were still the same, killing him hadn’t changed that. So you were back to your old tactics, imploring Allen to help you, using any ounce of charm you had left to rope him in. But it had worn you down, eroded you, you didn’t have it in you to be insouciant and dashing, and soon you were desperate, begging, at his mercy this time. Summoning the last of your strength, reaching through the bars to touch his hand, eyes lidded, voice low. You can do this one more time.

_Please don’t leave me here_

But then he comes back, eyes hard, he’s made his choice. And his words, always so powerful, turned against you now, they take the breath out of you.

_You loved him back_

The blood drains from your face, and there’s tightness in your throat because he’s right, of course he is, you loved him, and it’s sick and revolting but it’s true. To hear someone else say it is like a hammer blow, all the bravado you built up is gone- you’re a scared boy trembling on the sheets again. And the last sentence, the punch line, delivered like an indictment, like a curse-

_And if you try to let them go, they only circle back and return to you. They become part of who you are._

He was always such a good writer. He knew what you would become before you did, that damn letter the worst kind of prophecy.

Because you never got rid of him. And after that everything was a game, an elaborate dance- there was always a winner and a loser. Every word, every look, every touch was a battle, and you were determined to come out on top this time. Your own son looking back at you with a face like your own- innocent, full of life, unspoiled. It infuriated you, and it terrified you, because he was so light, so blindingly light, he illuminated things in you that you didn’t want to see. But every light has a switch, and you turned his off before he could get you first. We all start out a blank page, but some of us get ink spilled on us before we get the chance to write our own story. Except this time you were spilling the ink.  You were completely different- the hard hand of the Father, not the gentle caresses of the Lover, and you never confused the distinction between the two. You had no desire to do what he did to you to him, the thought sickened you, it made your skin crawl. But you needed to protect yourself, you needed to be the one with the upper hand, so you did it with bruises and welts instead and you did it well. You would never be a victim again; it was you who called the shots. But there’s a thin line between having control and losing it- after all, who has more power, the one being worshipped or the one on their knees?

No, you didn’t get rid of him.

You became him.

****

When he finally looks back at you, the fury is gone from his eyes, replaced by something very sad, and worst of all, a horrible kind of pity.  The kind of look you give when you’re thinking okay, I’ve taken the worst you can give me, you don’t have the power to hurt me anymore.

But they do. And they will.

When he speaks his voice shakes at first, but then gathers strength.

_No, it doesn’t mean that.  But it does mean that there’s still some terrible bond between you and your tormentor._

And suddenly you're boy standing in the shower again, the slightly older boy sinking him in the river- you washed and scrubbed and you thought you’d gotten the stain out. But sometimes the scar of a stain hurts just as much, and all the water in the world couldn’t get rid of that. 

You can see yourself, spread out like an offering, moonlight tracing the bones in your face. This is the body, given for you. He marked himself on you so permanently that even killing him couldn’t erase it, and every day you love him and hate him and forgive him and then condemn him all over again, and you’re so goddamn tired but there’s never any rest.

As your son leaves, you wonder who he’s going to go out and ruin in order to try and put himself back together.  Just like David, just like you.

Do this in remembrance of me.


End file.
